Mother board & CPU

[Douglas McDonald]

Well I built a new PC the other day. I'm not into gaming or over clocking stuff but I did find something very useful with the MB - CPU selection.

I got a new (re certified) MSI motherboard $65, one of the newer mil-spec models (USB 3.0 SATA 6, solid caps and lots of other goodies), and a AMD Phenon II X3 CPU $89. Bought at Newegg

It turns out that the motherboard BIOS has the ability to unlock unused cores. Seems Intel and AMD 2 core chips are really 4 core with two locked out. Same with the new 6 core chips (most 4 core are really 6 core). One setting in the BIOS unlocks unused cores. Ya right I thought.............Damm it works. One change in the BIOS and I now have a x4 at 3.6 ghz. The original spec was x3(cores) at 2.8 Ghz. Now I turned off the over clock since I really don't want or need to push it. It runs perfectly stable even over-clocked.

From what I've read 95% of 2 core chips are good 4 core chips but its cheaper to use one die and make all 4 cores (or 6). Its a marketing thing.

If you build your own PC's you can double your performance at half the price. Most of the new MB mfrs are have this now. MSI, ASUS, GIGABYTE, FOX ect....

Anyway sorry to boar you all with this but I was surprised how simple it is and how much we are being ripped of by the DELL's of the world. I've been building my own PC's for a long time and never really looked into this. Just thought I'd pass on the info.

Doug

[Paul Squires]

That is very interesting. Wow, hard to believe that a simple BIOS change would enable such functionality. Amazing that they would create the same CPU with 4 cores but sell it only enabling 2 cores...but, then again, the marketing world is a very strange place indeed.

[Nathan Durland]

Not too surprising.  The root of hte over-clocking thing started back in the day of 386 & 486's. Intel pretty much made them all the same.  They'd test by progressively cranking up the speed and when the chip destabilized, they'd back it down a bit and rate it at that speed.  Makes manufacturing sense, I guess.

[Peter House]

From what I can find, this is only true for AMD chips.  When Intel has a multi core with a bad core, they permanently disable the extra cores.

AMD locks them out with flags which the BIOS can apparently bypass.  If you are re enabling these cores, it is like overclocking - you do so at your own risk of instability.

Overclocking is a fun hobby but I don't want my livelihood to depend on it day to day. 

[Douglas McDonald]

I totally agree its a chance but in my case its been over a month with zero problems. MSI claims some Intel icore CPU's can be unlocked too.

I look at it this way. I bought the system I wanted and the spec's I needed. At that time I didn't even know about this stuff. So for me its like getting a free core. I don't care about the overclocking stuff but that too is seamless. At idle my cpu runs at 800mhz and then runs up to 3.4 ghz as needed. needless to say 99.5% its at 800mhz. Its just nice to have the option and in this case it is VERY stable.

Doug

[Roger Garstang]

Interesting.  Might be a reason to build one with AMD next time.  Only thing I'd watch is cooling since they may put a smaller fan/heatsink, etc on the lower cores and larger on the CPUs with more cores enabled.

[Douglas McDonald]

I always use a good heat sink usually a Zelman. Its well worth the money

[Douglas McDonald]

Now its in the news that Intel is selling a $50 gift card to "unlock" there unused cores:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11379089

As I said in a post here Intel does it also but their really ripping people off on purpose. So is AMD but they lock out core for a different reason. Like my CPU I can run all for cores and not extreme overclock or I can overclock and run 3 cores but not both. There is a flaw in the chip and thats why it was sold as a 3 cor. That said, its a marketing thing also. I understand that most all of the new 4 core are good 6 cores. Just cheaper to make them that way.
Doug